


Your Soul Shakes Free

by sequence_fairy



Category: Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon | Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Fluff, Nebulous Canon Setting, Put it where you think it fits the best, They are soul bonded in the most spectacular way, Usagi and Mamoru would find each other in any universe, Usagi's particular brand of recklessness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-01
Updated: 2019-03-01
Packaged: 2019-11-07 09:41:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17958110
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sequence_fairy/pseuds/sequence_fairy
Summary: She knows him, she can feel it, soul deep, but she’s never seen him before he swept in out of the rain. She doesn’t know his name, but she knows the slope of his shoulders and the line of his jaw, could trace the bow of his lips with the pads of her fingers in the dark.





	Your Soul Shakes Free

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kazzashepard](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kazzashepard/gifts).



> This year's UsaMamo Fanwork Exchange offering! I had the pleasure of writing with a mostly blank slate and I hope you like this v much!

White light rockets hot and vicious towards the other senshi.

Usagi doesn’t hesitate.

She leaps, flinging herself across the distance. The beam hits her, centre mass, and she screams. The world disappears in a flash of brilliant silver.

 

–– 

 

The city is alive under the hissing spray of the rain that soaks it to the deepest recesses. Heedless of the deluge, cars slide past the diner, and what people are out, hurry along, umbrellas up and collars pulled tight against the damp. Usagi leans on the counter, wet rag forgotten beside her elbow and chin resting in the palm of one hand. Rei clocked out an hour ago, racing for the bus at the corner.

This rain is bad for business, Makoto says, but Usagi likes the quiet. It gives her time to think. In the back, the radio bleeds static, the white noise buried under the steady patter of rain against the plate glass windows. It’s late. Usagi drags her gaze from the window and looks up at the clock on the far wall. Two more hours until she can flip the little sign in the door over and turn off the lights, and then another half hour until she’ll be turning the lock in her door and tiptoeing through the shoebox apartment she shares with Ami, being careful not to wake her sleeping roommate.

Nights like this, Usagi is grateful that Makoto spends the down time in the greenhouse. If someone comes in wanting more than coffee or pie, Usagi can run up the rickety stairs to the roof to get her, but otherwise, the diner is Usagi’s kingdom. She pushes off the counter, rocking back on her heels and stretching her hands up over her head. Her spine cracks as she does.

Shaking out her shoulders, Usagi lets her eyes wander over the tables, surveying her domain and decides it’s not too early to start wiping down banquettes and turns on her heel to fill a bucket and grab a rag. 

Another hour passes and still no one comes in. Usagi has cleaned the coffee machine for the fifth time this shift, wiped the counter down to a sparkling sheen, and carefully refilled all the sugar containers. She’s back to leaning against the counter, this time resting on both elbows, chin in her hands and eyes fixed longingly at the clock when the bell over the door chimes.

A gust of wind accompanies the person who enters, and the scent of cold exhaust and damp pavement hangs in the air until the door shuts with a glass-rattling bang. Usagi straightens, dropping the rag onto the shelf under the countertop. He’s dripping onto the mat. Dark hair falls into his face, but he pushes it back with a gloved hand, and catches her gaze.

Usagi feels the moment their gazes connect like a jolt of lightning.

His eyes are dark, and echoing with something achingly sad. Usagi’s heart stumbles in her chest, a beat skipped with a twinge of pain deep between her ribs. His eyes, she thinks, hardly able to draw breath, his eyes. She knows them, knows the way they crinkle at the corners when he smiles, knows the way they flare wide with fear, knows the way they go soft with exasperated fondness.

She knows him, she can feel it, soul deep, but she’s never seen him before he swept in out of the rain. She doesn’t know his name, but she knows the slope of his shoulders and the line of his jaw, could trace the bow of his lips with the pads of her fingers in the dark.

He shrugs out of his coat, breaking their gaze, and a flash of red on the lining catches Usagi’s eye and her heart leaps into her throat. A vision of scarlet petals and the glint of moonlight on ivory sears across Usagi’s nerves, leaving her gasping in its wake.

The man drapes his coat carefully over the back of one of the stools at the counter, down at the far end. “Coffee?” he asks, sitting down. He’s wearing a black jacket over a deeply green shirt, the collar unbuttoned enough to show the hollow of his throat. Usagi has to stop herself from looking.

“Of course,” Usagi says, managing without a stutter. She turns away towards the coffee machine. Reaching up, she pulls down one of the heavy mugs, and sets it gently on the back bar, carefully measuring sugar and cream and then pouring the coffee in, stirring the spoon gently while the colour changes. 

When she passes him his coffee, their hands brush, and electricity skates down Usagi’s spine. Something pulses in the edges of her vision. The man takes the cup of coffee and looks down at it, and then back up at her, a question on his face.

Usagi flushes. “Oh,” she says, “I’m so sorry, I just made it on autopilot! I can make you another, no problem.”

The man shakes his head and takes a cautious sip. He swallows, and then wraps his hand more fully around the mug. “It’s perfect,” he says, something like wonder in his voice. “How did you know?” 

“I don’t–I’m not–” Usagi wrings her hands. How did she know how to make his coffee? It was second nature, like she’d done it a hundred times before, like she’d always know how much sugar to put in the mug, what colour the final mix should be and how sweet he prefers it, late on a rainy night. “Who are you?” she breathes, barely audible, before she can stop herself. 

She’s close enough to hear the hitch in his own inhale.

“Do I know you?” he asks, voice warmed by the coffee. He sets the mug down with a gentle noise, giving her the fullness of his attention. “You seem–I feel like I know you, like we’ve met before, but I think I’d have remembered you.”

“I feel like I know you too,” Usagi says in a rush. It’s Mina who’s always talking about soul mates and destiny, and for the first time in her life, Usagi thinks there might be some truth to the fairytales. This can’t be mere coincidence on a rainy Tuesday night.

“I’m Mamoru Chiba,” he says, reaching out to shake Usagi’s hand.

“Usagi Tsukino,” Usagi answers, heart pounding in her ears. She takes his hand in hers.

The moment their palms brush, the diner falls away in a rush of white light. Usagi stumbles back, expecting the back bar to be there underneath her reaching hands but there’s nothing but empty air. 

She falls.

Air whistles past her ears, wind tangling in the ends of her hair. Usagi screws her eyes shut. She doesn’t want to see the ground she is sure she is hurtling towards. Her lungs compress, cutting off her scream. 

“Usagi!” The voice is familiar and laced with terror and Usagi knows no more.

 

––  

 

“What happened?”

“I saw her get hit, and then she went down, hard.”

“Do we need to take her to a hospital?”

“No,” Ami says, voice soft and somewhere near Usagi’s head, “she’s already coming around.”

Usagi opens her eyes. Arrayed above her are her senshi’s faces. They look worried but relieved.

“Welcome back,” Makoto says, long brown hair falling over her shoulder.

“You had us worried there.” Mina’s hand is a warm weight on Usagi’s shoulder.

“Where’s Mamoru?” Usagi asks, pushing herself up to sitting. 

“He’s okay,” Rei says, “you need to take it easy.”

“No,” Usagi argues, “I’m fine. I need–”

“You were actually unconscious, so no, you need to lie back down and let me make sure you don’t have a concussion,” Ami retorts.

“No!” Usagi says. There’s a frantic urgency in the tripping beat of her heart, a desperate yearning in her blood. “I need to see him, you don’t understand.”

“He’s fine, okay? He’s just handling something, but he’s okay, just let us make sure you’re okay, please, princess.” Mina’s voice is stricken with worry, and Usagi blinks. They never call her princess. Something awful must have happened. Something terrible, something involving Mamoru, something they’re not telling her.

Usagi’s pulse quickens, her breaths coming in heaving gasps, and the world narrowing to the drop of red that stands out stark against the white of her gloves. As red as the petals of one of his roses, but not a petal. A weight settles on Usagi’s chest, there’s no air, she can’t breathe. She can’t see, there’s nothing to hear but the roaring of her blood in her own ears.

All she can see is the red on the white, so dark and luscious, a jewel against the palm of her glove. Is it hers? Is it his? Is it someone else’s? There’s only one person whose blood she’d know, she thinks, mind spiraling into catastrophes and disasters. Usagi closes her eyes, and all she can see are his eyes, pleading, begging, desperate. Then, empty, dead and all the light behind them snuffed out.

“No,” she says, “no, no, no, no.” The word is a chant, a mantra, a desperate prayer. No. He can’t be gone, he can’t, she categorically refuses. She will not live in a world without him again. Even in the fantasy world where she was a diner waitress, they still found each other. As strangers, but even still, the pull was there, Usagi would know him in any world, any universe, any time.

“Usagi!” Makoto’s voice cuts through the panic, strident. “Girl, you gotta breathe, okay? With me,” Makoto says, and takes Usagi’s hand. “In, one, two, three, four.”

Makoto leads Usagi through enough breaths to get her to calm down, and behind them, the rest of the senshi have a whispered conversation Usagi tries hard not to pay attention to. After several breaths, Usagi tugs on Makoto’s hand. “He’s really okay?” she asks, voice husked.

“See for yourself,” Makoto says, shifting so Usagi can see around her. Mamoru is fine, standing tall and strong, cape billowing in the wind. “He’s standing watch, you know? Watching over us until you’re ready to go.” Makoto tangles her free hand in one of Usagi’s ponytails, tugging gently. “He was so worried.”

“What happened?” Usagi asks, grounding herself in the feel of Makoto’s fingers combing through the length of her hair.

“We were fighting, and suddenly this energy beam is coming straight for us. You threw yourself in front of us, took the blast full on.” Makoto’s shoulders hunch, then relax, in careful degrees. “You went down like a limp noodle, it was all we could do to keep you safe ‘til Tuxedo Mask showed up. He saw you all sprawled out on the ground and, oh, Usagi, his face.”

“What about his face?” 

“I’ve never seen him look so fierce,” Makoto says, with a soft sigh. Usagi tries to imagine it. She thinks of the set of his jaw, the jut of his chin, the dark line of his brows, pulled in and his eyes narrowed in determination. “I think you’re okay now,” Makoto says, interrupting Usagi’s reverie. 

“I’m fine, I was before, I still am,” Usagi says. Makoto rises to her feet and reaches down for Usagi’s hand, pulling her to her feet as well. 

“I know,” Makoto agrees, “we’re just looking out for you, okay? Let us do that.”

Usagi flushes, the prickle of shame crawling up the back of her neck. She turns to see that the other senshi have stopped talking and are watching her and Makoto carefully. “I’m sorry,” Usagi says, “I didn’t mean to make you worry about me.”

Usagi lets herself be drawn in for hugs, and feels more whole than she has since she woke up when they release her.

She turns at the press of a hand against her shoulder. It’s Mamoru. “You scared me,” he says, eyes dark.

“I scared everyone,” Usagi says, contrite. She doesn’t mean to be reckless, but she’d throw herself in front of anything for the other senshi, fall on her own sword for them, break herself into millions of pieces to save them. She’d do anything for them, she’d give anything for them.

“I thought I’d lost you,” he says, pulling her close, arms wrapped tight around her waist. He drops his head forward, burying his face in her neck. Usagi can feel his lips on her skin, and she tightens her grip around his shoulders, holding onto him like he might fly apart at any moment. Just as she’d give anything for her friends, she’d do that and twice over for him. 

“I’m right here,” she says, even though the words never feel like quite enough. “I’ll never lose you,” she says, and knows it’s true, as sure as she knew him in the diner, as sure as she knows him now. Theirs is a bond that goes soul deep. Mamoru pulls back far enough to look into her face, and she leans up onto her toes. He cups her cheek in his palm and presses their lips together. 

When they break apart, Mamoru smiles, soft and fond. His eyes crinkle at the corners behind his mask. “I love you,” he says, voice like warm sweet coffee, and Usagi feels the echo of his smile on her own face.

“I love you, too,” she answers. 

Above them, the moon hangs, a silvered crescent, watchful and silent. 

**Author's Note:**

> Please come and chat with me about my fic on [tumblr](http://sequencefairy.tumblr.com) or on [twitter](https://twitter.com/warpspeed_chic).


End file.
